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on Technology and Industrial Dynamics |
| By: | Enrique López-Bazo (AQR Research Group-IREA, University of Barcelona); Elisabet Motellón (AQR Research Group-IREA, University of Barcelona. Universitat Oberta de Catalunya) |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the role of regional determinants on innovation performance controlling by the firm’s absorptive capacity and other sources of firm heterogeneity. The findings for a sample of firms in Spain support the hypothesis that regional determinants matter, though their role is subtler than the one frequently assumed. Rather than a direct influence on firm’s innovation, the regional context moderates the effect of internal determinants. In the case of product innovation the most important mechanism of interaction seems to be operating through cooperation in innovation, whereas for process innovation it seems to be through highly skilled labour. |
| Keywords: | product innovation, process innovation, firm, multilevel modelling, Spanish regions JEL classification: D21; O31; R10; R15 |
| Date: | 2016–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aqr:wpaper:201607&r=tid |
| By: | Crafts, Nicholas (University of Warwick) |
| Abstract: | This paper reviews the literature on the implications of EU membership for the UK. It concludes that membership has raised UK income levels appreciably and by much more than 1970s’ proponents of EU entry predicted. These positive effects stem from the EU’s success in increasing trade and the impact of stronger competition on UK productivity. The economic benefits of EU membership for the UK have far exceeded the costs of budgetary transfers and regulation. Brexit is risky and its impact would depend heavily on the terms negotiated and the use made of the policy space that it freed up. |
| Keywords: | Brexit; competition; income levels; SingleMarket; trade costs. JEL Classification: F15; N14; N74. |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:wacage:280&r=tid |
| By: | Valmari, Nelli |
| Abstract: | Despite the fact that multiproduct firms constitute a considerable share of firms and account for an even greater share of production, virtually all production function estimates are based on the assumption that firms are single-product producers. The single-product assumption is made due to lack of data on input allocation across the various product lines multiproduct firms operate. I provide a method to estimate product-level production functions without observable input allocations. The empirical application and Monte Carlo simulations show that the single-product firm assumption leads to biased parameter and productivity estimates and overestimated productivity differences between firms. |
| Keywords: | Multiproduct firm, production function, productivity |
| JEL: | D24 L11 L25 |
| Date: | 2016–03–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rif:wpaper:37&r=tid |
| By: | Brad J. Hershbein (W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research); Lisa B. Kahn (Yale University) |
| Abstract: | Routine-biased technological change (RBTC), whereby routine-task jobs are replaced by machines and overseas labor, shifts demand towards high- and low-skill jobs, resulting in job polarization of the U.S. labor market. We test whether recessions accelerate this process. In doing so we establish a new fact about the demand for skill over the business cycle. Using a new database containing the near-universe of electronic job vacancies that span the Great Recession, we find evidence of upskilling—firms demanding more-skilled workers when local employment growth is slower. We find that upskilling is sizable in magnitude and largely due to changes in skill requirements within firm-occupation cells. We argue that upskilling is driven primarily by firm restructuring of production towards more-skilled workers. We show that 1) skill demand remains elevated after local economies recover from the Great Recession, driven primarily by the same firms that upskilled early in the recovery; 2) among publicly traded firms in our data, those that upskill more also increase capital stock by more over the same time period; and 3) upskilling is concentrated within routine-task occupations -- those most vulnerable to RBTC. Our result is unlikely to be driven by firms opportunistically seeking to hire more-skilled workers in a slack labor market, and we rule out other cyclical explanations. We thus present the first direct evidence that the Great Recession precipitated new technological adoption. |
| Keywords: | Job polarization, job postings, RBTC, recessions, routine-biased technological change, upskilling, vacancies |
| JEL: | D22 E32 J23 J24 M51 O33 |
| Date: | 2016–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:upj:weupjo:16-254&r=tid |
| By: | Nancy L. Stokey |
| Abstract: | Technical change, even if it is limited in scope, can have employment, output, price and wage effects that ripple through the whole economy. This paper uses a flexible and tractable framework, with heterogeneous workers and technologies, and many tasks/goods, to analyze the general equilibrium effects of technical change for a limited set of tasks. Output increases and price falls for tasks that are directly affected. The effects on employment depend on the elasticity of substitution across tasks/goods. For high elasticities, employment expands to a group of more skilled workers. Hence for tasks farther up the technology ladder, employment falls, output declines, and prices and wages rise. For low elasticities, employment at affected tasks contracts among less skilled workers, as they shift to complementary tasks with unchanged technologies. In all cases, the output, price and wage changes are damped for more distant tasks, both above and below the affected group. |
| JEL: | D50 E24 O33 O40 |
| Date: | 2016–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:22176&r=tid |
| By: | Rune Dahl Fitjar; Franz Huber; Andrés Rodríguez-Pose |
| Abstract: | This paper analyses how the formation of collaboration networks affects firm-level innovation by applying the ‘Goldilocks principle’. The ‘Goldilocks principle’ of optimal distance in innovation networks postulates that the best firm-level innovation results are achieved when the partners involved in the network are located at the ‘right’ distance, i.e. ‘not too close and not too far’ from one another, across non-geographical proximity dimensions. This principle is tested on a survey of 542 Norwegian firms conducted in 2013, containing information about firm-level innovation activities and key innovation partners. The results of the ordinal logit regression analysis substantiate the Goldilocks principle, as the most innovative firms are found amongst those that collaborate with partners at medium levels of proximity for all non-geographical dimensions. The analysis also underscores the importance of the presence of a substitution-innovation mechanism, with geographical distance problems being compensated by proximity in other dimensions as a driver of innovation, whilst there is no support for a potential overlap-innovation mechanism. |
| Keywords: | Proximities, innovation, networks, collaboration, Goldilocks principle, Norway |
| JEL: | O31 O33 D85 |
| Date: | 2016–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:egu:wpaper:1609&r=tid |
| By: | Amandine Pinget (IREGE - Institut de Recherche en Gestion et en Economie - USMB [Université de Savoie] [Université de Chambéry] - Université Savoie Mont Blanc); Rachel Bocquet (IREGE - Institut de Recherche en Gestion et en Economie - USMB [Université de Savoie] [Université de Chambéry] - Université Savoie Mont Blanc); Caroline Mothe (IREGE - Institut de Recherche en Gestion et en Economie - USMB [Université de Savoie] [Université de Chambéry] - Université Savoie Mont Blanc) |
| Abstract: | Recent literature explores the determinants of environmental innovations (EI) but rarely addresses obstacles to these innovations. To our knowledge, no previous study accounts for antecedents of EI to explore the various perceived barriers to EI for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Noting the importance of SMEs in European economies, this article identifies the extent to which SMEs perceive barriers to environmental innovations, considering their type, number, and intensity. With a merged data set of 435 French SMEs, we investigate different perceptions of environmentally innovative SMEs, compared with those of technologically innovative SMEs and non-innovative ones, using a multiple treatment model that integrates the antecedents. We thereby analyze SME CEO's perceptions of barriers to EI. The barriers are not only more numerous but also more important for SMEs that engage in environmental innovation activity compared with those that have introduced only technological innovation or those that do not undertake any innovation activity. |
| Keywords: | SME,Multiple treatment model,CEO perceptions,Antecedents,Barriers,Environmental innovation |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-01300837&r=tid |
| By: | Michele Cincera; Anabela Marques Santos |
| JEL: | O31 O38 O52 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ict:wpaper:2013/229382&r=tid |